René de Gas

Edgar Degas

National Gallery of Art

Shown from the chest up, a young, pale-skinned boy dressed in black turns to face us in this vertical portrait painting. His body is angled to our left, but he turns his head back to gaze at us from the corners of his large, hazel-brown eyes under thin arched brows. He has an upturned nose set in a round face, and his coral-red mouth is slightly open. His short dark brown hair is parted on the side and falls just below his ears. He wears a tall, oyster-white collar under a loose-fitting, black jacket tied with a black bow at the neck. The background is brownish-olive green.